The myth of journalistic objectivism was started when the Democrats and Republicans got together (that was a long, long, time, ago, before I was born, let alone you, my child) and decided that from then on, every story would have exactly two sides, Democratic and Republican, neither more nor less, and that consequently they must be given equal emphasis, time, and credibility.

This was actually enshrined in law by the three networks of the day, but it all went to Hell immediately.

For one thing, objectivism is nothing like honesty, or accuracy, or truth. It is more like a kind of perverse blinkers that objectify truthiness by treating every statement, proposition, opinion, or ideology as equally valid and equally trivial.

As practiced during my youth, objectivity was a kind of consensual reality or conventional wisdom which could not be criticized or doubted by journalists, at least in public, or editors who disagreed with their publisher's editorial policy.

It was one of the stupidest things ever done and thus a vital part of American politics, media and journalism. It even worked its way into the media practices of other countries to some extent, but not so much that you couldn't tell an American news report from a Canadian, Australian or British one.

Now it has been replaced with Fox News, a viciously opiniated, ideologically-blinkered, ultra-partisan anti-objectivity where truthiness totally replaces even a passing acquaintance with truth, on one side, and every body else (which is to say the Main Stream Media, a Liberal Conspiracy that almost totally agrees with Fox News except on minor details, such as facts) on the other side. Outside of this pseudo-dichotomy is everybody who does not make over $1,000,000 a year for appearing on TV, minus the experts, who appear on TV for the Hell of it.

Clearly the requirement that "journalists" and "news" be objective, which is to say two-sided and perfectly balanced, has been lost. At Fox News (by which we almost always mean the Op Ed Pages of the Fox News Network, which actually still does fairly informative and accurate news reports BUT NOT ON TV OR CABLE, they have decided to take one side only and to do it to death, in a giantreductio ad absurdum et credo quia absurdum est. This side fits in nicely with Murdoch's policy of keeping his hands off of any editor or property who is just exactly like him in the minutest detail. Self-censorship is obligatory, all else is free because Murdoch is not paying for it.

This seems like rank hypocrisy since Murdoch is a vile little poisonous toad who will happily bite the hand that feeds him if he is feeling the least bit peckesh, but in reality, it is pretty much the way all the Evil Press Overlords have always acted. Murdoch is old school. By which I mean a Luciferian purveyor of Dark Satanic News Mills.

No wait, I'm wrong. The myth of journalistic objectivity was actually the journalistic face of the Nineteenth Century trend known as logical positivism. This was supposedly the ideological underpinning of scientific rigour. It was resolutely reductionist, phenominal and materialist, rational and fact-based. Except that it was no such thing.

Like Ayn Rand's Objectivism, logical positivism and journalistic objectivity are complete and utter bullshiat which are scientist, not scientific, objectifying not objective, and full of shiat.

My love of satire and humour (Mark Twain, Ambroise Bierce, Charles Hoy Fort, H.L. Mencken, MAD magazine, Steve Colbert, etc.) has led me to be extremely suspicious and derisive of claims of objectivity and to suspect any belief held in common by Democrats and Republicans, Liberals and Conservatives, the Government and the Opposition, or any two persons whom you would not trust separately and individually. All is Maya, Delusion. Especially the news. The Buddha taught us that, or perhaps he meant to, but forgot because he had a lot of nothing on his mind.

The sad thing is that even good journalists are still taught, and still believe in, journalistic objectivity as a good, if not real, thing, as much as engineers and other jerks of that sort believe their professors on the first day of classes when the lying farkers tell them that they will be taught to think.

Teaching engineers that they are logical, rational, sane, etc., is a crime, very akin to telling them that they are consequently infallible and better than other people. Which is the lesson they really learn, the bastards.

These are just lies that professionals tell themselves and their clients. They sadly tend to believe them.

A complete contempt for journalists and editors plus connections and a certain ability to kiss ass will get you a job as publisher on any organ in Murdoch's God's Creation.

For example, the one thing I like about Lord Conrad Flack of Hackfarbour is his uttter seething hatred and contempt of journalists except for those who kiss his ass and hew to his party line, such as his lovely wife Babs did for 15 years before landing her trout.

In other words, Evil Press Overlords hate all journalists except dishonest, corrupt, and bad ones that agree with them.

He was one of the greatest jerks that America and the Anglo-American Empire have ever produced.

He was a drunk and was once observed pissing into a potted palm behind the door in the salon of one of America's great society hostesses. (I would say that Lyndon B. Johnson, who pissed on the leg of a Secret Service agent, has him beat there, but this is the least of his social faux pas, which were often intentional insults rather than mere conveniences.)

I am not sure he is the same Gordon Bennett that people swear by, but he could be!

After all we swear by God, the Devil and shiat, and Gordon Bennett was close to being all three.

brantgoose:My love of satire and humour (Mark Twain, Ambroise Bierce, Charles Hoy Fort, H.L. Mencken, MAD magazine, Steve Colbert, etc.) has led me to be extremely suspicious and derisive of claims of objectivity and to suspect any belief held in common by Democrats and Republicans, Liberals and Conservatives, the Government and the Opposition, or any two persons whom you would not trust separately and individually. All is Maya, Delusion. Especially the news. The Buddha taught us that, or perhaps he meant to, but forgot because he had a lot of nothing on his mind.

The big difference, it seems to me anyway, is the RMS owned a small and widely disrepected newspaper in a larger market that was served by other papers. Much like the Rev. Moon's Washington Times was the laughed-at also ran in a market dominated by the Washington Post. But in this case, one guy owns two rival newspapers, the ONLY two in the media market. that's ..not good.

TFH:Hey, remember the bad old days of "yellow journalism" when ultra-rich robber barons owned almost all the newspapers and openly slanted the news to advance their ideological agendas? Good thing those days are long gone and never coming back right?

No, they never were "long gone." It's always been that way. Bad headline, bad subby!

Are you suggesting that this site's owner has become the very type of person that he vilified in his much promoted book? If only there were some sort of tag that could fully describe that type of ironic situation....

I thought this type of crankery was limited to blogs and youtube comments.

The editorial page named Obama the worst U.S. president and predicted a second term will result in "Arab terror states" attacking Israel, "death panels" rationing health care, income tax rates between 60 and 70 percent for many Californians and an attempt to get taxpayers to pay for late-term abortions. It warned of an effort to erase "In God We Trust" from U.S. currency.

Baryogenesis:I thought this type of crankery was limited to blogs and youtube comments.

The editorial page named Obama the worst U.S. president and predicted a second term will result in "Arab terror states" attacking Israel, "death panels" rationing health care, income tax rates between 60 and 70 percent for many Californians and an attempt to get taxpayers to pay for late-term abortions. It warned of an effort to erase "In God We Trust" from U.S. currency.

I think you really need to work to be worse than Buchanan. The highlight of his presidency was his lame-duck period, when shiat sort of started to work again because Lincoln was covertly running things through proxies.

If you really want to get permanently depressed listen to some c-span. You see both sides are equally idiotic and grandstanding. And the call in portion proves that the average voter can't be trusted to do anything as trivial as change their own tire much less form a rational opinion on the issues and candidates.

Baryogenesis:I thought this type of crankery was limited to blogs and youtube comments.

The editorial page named Obama the worst U.S. president and predicted a second term will result in "Arab terror states" attacking Israel, "death panels" rationing health care, income tax rates between 60 and 70 percent for many Californians and an attempt to get taxpayers to pay for late-term abortions. It warned of an effort to erase "In God We Trust" from U.S. currency.

Given the incredible accuracy of the far-right's predictions of Obama's first term, I have no reason to think that every single one of these things won't happen.

Whargarbbble: Its not making false news when you leave out important parts of what the fark happened. /Wharrragrblee

/So tired of seeing news articles that leave out the reason for the why the horrible horrible guy 'had' to kill them poor teenagers or bicyclists.//hint: Self defense.///but spectacular headlines and missing information sells more news to R-etards.

Is this the thread where we pretend that all of the media is involved in a left-wing conspiracy and only Fox News is honest or the thread where we pretend that Fox News is proof that all of the media is right-wing?

Callous:Is this the thread where we pretend that all of the media is involved in a left-wing conspiracy and only Fox News is honest or the thread where we pretend that Fox News is proof that all of the media is right-wing?

The important thing is you've managed to appear superior to both. You are very revolutionary indeed.

Are you suggesting that this site's owner has become the very type of person that he vilified in his much promoted book? If only there were some sort of tag that could fully describe that type of ironic situation....

There may have never been any real objectivity, but years ago at least, people knew that they were supposed to try. Now, nobody even hides their bias. It's like ethics, at least people used to realize that they were a good thing.

manimal2878:I want to stab anyone that claims the medias is liberal. They are biased, but it is not a liberal point of view. Look who owns the media, how liberal could any of them really be?

QFT

On average, US journalists may lean a little left. On average, it really is just a little. Remember, a US Democrat would be a conservative in most of the rest of the developed world. If you think US Democrats are liberal, you don't know what a liberal is.

The bosses of those journalists? The owners of their news organizations? Overwhelmingly conservative, overwhelmingly right of center. They keep their employees on a pretty short leash.

RembrandtQEinstein:If you really want to get permanently depressed listen to some c-span. You see both sides are equally idiotic and grandstanding. And the call in portion proves that the average voter can't be trusted to do anything as trivial as change their own tire socks much less form a rational opinion on the issues and candidates.

You give the average voter way too much credit by assuming they're almost competent enough to change a tire.

Manchester, 70, is likened to a smaller market version of Rupert Murdoch

Yeah, except Murdoch is backing Obama.

rico567:TFH: Hey, remember the bad old days of "yellow journalism" when ultra-rich robber barons owned almost all the newspapers and openly slanted the news to advance their ideological agendas? Good thing those days are long gone and never coming back right?

No, they never were "long gone." It's always been that way. Bad headline, bad subby!

RandomRandom:Remember, a US Democrat would be a conservative in most of the rest of the developed world. If you think US Democrats are liberal, you don't know what a liberal is.

Let's turn that around, though. Remember, a European politician would be a liberal in most of the rest of the developed world. What we consider the developed world is basically the US and Europe. (And Japan and South Korea, but only god knows how their politics work) If you eliminate half that equation, you get a remarkably biased remaining sample.